Hudson T
Hospitals. 1990 Apr 5;64(7):30, 33-4.
As state Medicaid agencies struggle to cut costs for prescription drugs, their main tool has been the use of drug formularies--a state-approved list of thousands of drugs that the agencies will reimburse for the treatment of Medicaid patients. Now, states are trying to use a second method that could reap big savings: requiring drug companies to bid to be included in the formulary. However, both cost-containment strategies have attracted the pharmaceutical industry's attention--and their lobbyists.
随着各州医疗补助机构努力削减处方药成本，他们的主要手段一直是使用药品处方集——这是一份经州政府批准的数千种药品清单，这些机构会为治疗医疗补助患者的药物予以报销。如今，各州正试图采用另一种有望大幅节省开支的方法：要求制药公司竞标列入处方集。然而，这两种成本控制策略都引起了制药行业的关注——以及他们的说客。
